Torquay United Fans Forum

Spot on Reg, it's far better to know what's going on than have no clue and be left to feed on rumours and our own pessimistic fears. Even if those fears are eventually realised, once that happens we know where we stand and can form an idea on how to move on from there.

Do us (and yourself) a favour TUFC and keep us in the loop!

now that the news of the Bristow Bench has appeared on the website, there has been a wave of enthusiasm and excitement across this forum, that hasn't been there for the past 2 weeks.

with the impending news re our new manager, and the subsequent player news, it would appear we've well and truly started the climb back up following recent disappointments.

so, when will the board realise, communicating with the fans WORKS ?!?!?!

even bad news is easier to swallow if you're told the truth, and kept in the picture, so come on TUFC, drag yourself into the present, and communicate with the fans. The news about the Bristow Bench has got everyone talking, positively, and no doubt put some smiles on faces. Wasn't that difficult was it ??

It is oft' said, [i][b]"There's no other business like football".[/b][/i]


The saying that most are familiar with : [b][i]"There's no business like show business."[/i][/b]


The whole object of show business is to entertain. Some aspects of it indeed do succeed.


Football sees itself as an aspect of the entertainment business. What the board of TUFC over the last month has managed to do, is not only entertain, but also make a laughing stock of itself. :nod:

Unfortunately, the Board members with the most vision are the ones in the silent minority at the moment. Until those currently making the decisions realise they're out of their depth, I can't see anything changing.

The frustrating thing about it all is that we mostly laugh it off as "The Torquay way", it's probably their greatest shortcoming as a group, I've seen it mentioned time after time and nothing ever seems to change for the better.

With regards to the emails that get sent out- I also run an online business and we are the ones that sent out those emails

Mark Boyce was brilliant in pushing it through, writing copy and making sure they happened but he and I basically ended up doing it all with no help and although they have been proven to increase attendance at matches and events plus massively increase shop sales ( which brings extra revenue to the club) they were shelved because "the people who work for the club can handle communication like that"

I thank the board for saving my club from going out of business and/or obscurity but some people up there at plainmoor need to wise up to the 21st century!

Season Ticket holders used to get a letter at the end of the season thanking us for our support and urging us to renew-with details of costs and,for a couple of seasons at least ,free admission to pre-season friendlies.
That was during the Bateson era if I recall,so we've gone backwards in terms of communications/PR on this issue,it would appear.

[quote="numpte"]The emails don't even have to be automated,they could be typed out, cut and paste by one of the ladies in the office..........oh forget about that idea.[/quote]

It'd be extremely easy to automate. Blimey, I could write something (or, more accurately, get someone in my office to write it!) in about 15 minutes. You have a template. You grab the names and email addresses from the database - or an excel spreadsheet even - and send it out.

The emails don't even have to be automated,they could be typed out, cut and paste by one of the ladies in the office..........oh forget about that idea.

they send out the newsletter things occasionally, so surely it can't be difficult to do as you say middevon, and send those loyal supporters some kind of correspondence regarding their season tickets etc. it really is very poor.

but when you see what's been going on over the past couple of days/weeks, you'd probably get your season ticket reminder some time in november, round about the same time they tell us Bevan has left the club.

another thing for denspad to bring up at the AGM maybe ??

Well said Middevon. We'd love regular updates, that's the main reason I come on here, news filters through much more quickly. And your idea of season ticket renewal reminder would probably serve to drum up a bit of business. The more I think about it the easier the process seems.

[quote="MidDevon"]Until this morning I had not renewed my season ticket. It always amazes me that every year they take all my details, email, address etc. and I have never ever been contacted by the club. Not even an email before today asking me to renew my ticket.

Most of you know I run an online business and I can say that it is pretty easy to manage a database of several hundred emails, not only that, it is pretty cheap to.

Perhaps an email thanking me for being a season ticket holder and telling me how to renew it would be nice?
Perhaps an email informing me of the pre-season friendlies would be nice.

I only send 1 email each month, letting customers know of new lines or offers, I give them the option of not receiving emails, but the very vast majority enjoy regular updates, I can't see fans of TUFC are any different.[/quote]

Could not agree more, you buy a pair of shoe's the shop takes your post code and e-mail address, Matalan make you pay £1 for a memeber ship card and take your e-mail address, Join Nectar they take your e-mail address, as we all know to hit you with a marketing campaign,wake up to this Tufc.

Until this morning I had not renewed my season ticket. It always amazes me that every year they take all my details, email, address etc. and I have never ever been contacted by the club. Not even an email before today asking me to renew my ticket.

Most of you know I run an online business and I can say that it is pretty easy to manage a database of several hundred emails, not only that, it is pretty cheap to.

Perhaps an email thanking me for being a season ticket holder and telling me how to renew it would be nice?
Perhaps an email informing me of the pre-season friendlies would be nice.

I only send 1 email each month, letting customers know of new lines or offers, I give them the option of not receiving emails, but the very vast majority enjoy regular updates, I can't see fans of TUFC are any different.

I believe so. At the big clubs you'd need to be a shareholder but if Torquay did that, they wouldn't have anyone there! I remember thinking I was able to go one year, but decided not to for whatever reason.

This AGM, is it open to the public?

Matt.

Am I the only one that thinks it is quite comical that the last posting on the website re: Scott Bevan is that the club stated they never knew Scott Bevan was going - they were waiting to hear back from him after clearly making him a fairly shoddy offer.

Since then he has signed, done a press conference and appeared all over the other media channels and yet according to the club

[quote]"When we have received facts, we will obviously inform our fans through the proper channels."[/quote]

Come on Torquay United - how difficult can it be to keep your fans updated? - This amounts to a farce and at a time when they need to be closer to the fans than ever.

Ok, that's item no.2 on my agenda at the AGM.